“Okay.”

“It means you get the feeling by an intuition.”

“And what was the intuition you got?”

“They said, ‘We are mindful that you have performed services for us in the past. We feel a desire to help you now. But this murder is a Japanese matter and thus we are unable to tell you everything that we might like to. From our reticence, you may draw useful conclusions about the underlying issue.’ That’s what they said to me.”

“And what is the underlying issue?”

“Well,” Connor said. “They mentioned MicroCon several times.”

“That high-tech company?”

“Yes. The one that’s being sold. Apparently it’s a small company in Silicon Valley that makes specialized computer machinery. And there are political problems about the sale. They referred to those problems several times.”

“So this murder has something to do with MicroCon?”

“I think so.” He shifted in his chair. “By the way, what did you learn at U.S.C. about the tapes?”

“For one thing, that they were duplicated.”

Connor nodded. “I assumed that,” he said.

“You did?”

“Ishiguro would never give us the originals. The Japanese think everybody who is not Japanese is a barbarian, They mean it, literally: barbarian. Stinking, vulgar, stupid barbarian. They’re polite about it, because they know you can’t help the misfortune of not being born Japanese. But they still think it.”

I nodded. That was more or less what Sanders had said, too.

“The other thing,” Connor said, “is that the Japanese are extremely successful, but they are not daring. They are plotters and plodders. So they’re not going to give us the originals because they don’t want to take any chances. Now. What else did you learn about the tapes?”

“What makes you think there was something else?” I said.

“When you looked at the tapes,” he said, “I’m sure you noticed an important detail that—“

And then we were interrupted by the telephone.

“Captain Connor,” said a cheerful voice, over the speaker phone. “This is Jerry Orr. Over at Sunset Hills Country Club? You left without taking the papers with you.”

“The papers?”

“The application,” Orr said. “You need to fill it out, Captain. Of course it’s just routine. I can assure you, there won’t be any problem with it, considering who your sponsors are.”

“My sponsors,” Connor said.

“Yes, sir,” Orr said. “And congratulations. As you know, it’s almost impossible to obtain a membership at Sunset these days. But Mr. Hanada’s company had already bought a corporate membership some time ago, and they have decided to put it in your name. I must say, it’s a very nice gesture from your friends.”

“Yes, it is,” Connor said, frowning.

I was looking at him.

“They know how fond you are of playing golf here,” Orr said. “You know the terms, of course. Hanada will purchase the membership over five years, but after that time, it’ll be transferred to your name. So when you retire from club membership, you’re free to sell it. Now: will you be picking up the paperwork here, or should I send it to your home?”

Connor said, “Mr. Orr, please convey my heartfelt appreciation to Mr. Hanada for his very great generosity. I hardly know what to say. But I will have to call you back about this.”

“That’s fine. You just let us know where to send it.”

“I’ll call you back,” Connor said.

He pushed the button to end the call, and stared forward, frowning. There was a long silence.

I said, “How much is a membership at that club worth?”

“Seven fifty. Maybe a million.”

I said, “Pretty nice gift from your friends.” I was thinking again of Graham, and the way Graham had always implied that Connor was in the pocket of the Japanese. There didn’t seem to be much doubt of it now.

Connor was shaking his head. “I don’t get it.”

“What’s not to get?” I said. “Jesus, Captain. Seems pretty straightforward to me.”

“No, I don’t get it,” Connor said.

And then the phone rang again. This time, it was for me.

“Lieutenant Smith? It’s Louise Gerber. I’m so glad I was able to reach you.”

I didn’t recognize her name. I said, “Yes?”

“Since tomorrow is Saturday, I was wondering if you had any time to look at a house.”

Then I remembered who she was. A month earlier I had gone out with a broker to look at houses. Michelle is getting older, and I wanted to get her out of an apartment. To get her a backyard if I could. It was pretty discouraging. Even with a real estate slump, the smallest houses were four and five hundred thousand. I couldn’t possibly qualify for that, on my salary.

“This is a very special situation,” she said, “and I thought of you and your little girl. It’s a small house in Palms—very small—but it’s a corner lot and it has a charming backyard. Flowers and a lovely lawn. The asking is three hundred. But the reason I thought of you is that the seller is willing to take back all the paper on it. I think you could get it for very little down. Do you want to see it?”

I said, “Who is the seller?”

“I don’t really know. It’s a special situation. The house is owned by an elderly woman who has gone into a nursing home and her son who lives in Topeka intends to sell it, but he wants an income flow instead of an outright sale. The property’s not formally listed yet, but I know the seller is motivated. If you could get in tomorrow, you might be able to do something. And the backyard is charming. I can just see your little girl there.”

Now Connor was looking at me. I said, “Miss Gerber, I’d have to know more about it. Who the seller is, and so on.

She sounded surprised. “Gee, I thought you’d jump at it. A situation like this doesn’t come along very often. Don’t you want to look at it?”

Connor was looking at me, nodding. He mouthed, say yes.

“I’ll have to get back to you about this,” I said.

“All right, Lieutenant,” she said. She sounded reluctant. “Please let me know.”

“I will.”

I hung up.

“What the hell is going on?” I said. Because there wasn’t any way to get around it. Between us, we had just been offered a lot of money. A lot of money.

Connor shook his head. “I don’t know.”

“Is it to do with MicroCon?”

“I don’t know. I thought MicroCon was a small company. This doesn’t make sense.” He looked very uneasy. “What exactly is MicroCon?”

I said, “I think I know who to ask.”

8

“MicroCon?” Ron Levine said, lighting a big cigar. “Sure, I can tell you about MicroCon. It’s an ugly story.”

We were sitting in the newsroom of American Financial Network, a cable news operation located near the airport. Through the window of Ron’s office, I could see the white satellite dishes on the roof of the adjacent garage. Ron puffed on his cigar and grinned at us. He had been a financial reporter at the Times before taking an on-camera job here. AFN was one of the few television operations where the on-camera people weren’t scripted; they had to know what they were talking about, and Ron did.

“MicroCon,” he said, “was formed five years ago by a consortium of American computer manufacturers. The company was intended to develop the next generation of X-ray lithography machines for computer chips. At the time MicroCon started up, there were no American manufacturers of lithography machines—they’d all been put out of business in the eighties, under intense competition from the Japanese. MicroCon developed new technology, and has been building machines for American companies. Okay?”

“Okay,” I said.

“Two years ago, MicroCon was sold to Darley-Higgins, a management company in Georgia. Darley’s other operations were foundering; the company decided to sell MicroCon to raise cash. They found a buyer in Akai Ceramics, an Osaka company that already made lithography machines in Japan. Akai had plenty of cash, and was willing to acquire the American company for a high price. Then Congress moved to stop the sale.”